And they lived happily ever after... 'Once Upon a Time' (OUAT) has confirmed that after seven seasons, the series is to come to an end. The magical series has offered up a refreshing spin on classical fairy tales over the past seven years and become one of the channels most popular shows. Majority of the original cast left the series at the end of the sixth season, and unfortunately the new cast has failed to convince audiences. The show will end this May after more than 150 episodes.
Showrunner Adam Horowitz who created the series alongside Edward Kitsis (with whom he also worked on 'Lost'), posted an image to his personal Instagram thanking fans for sticking with the show for so long.
Over the years, 'Once Upon a Time' has creatively reimagined some of the most classical tales including 'The Wizard of Oz', 'Peter Pan' and 'Beauty and the Beast'. The series even introduced the world of 'Frozen' into its storylines. In the seventh season, OUAT underwent a jump in time and rebooted itself with a whole new cast of characters, including a grown up Henry. Only 3 members of the original cast remained: Lana Parrilla (Regina), Robert Carlyle (Mr. Gold) and Colin O'Donoghue (Captain Hook). Many of the cast have spoken fondly of the series and the memories they have from working on its set.
Lana Pariillla made reference to the day she auditioned for the show with a post on her Instagram: "Thank you for standing by us all of these years. We hope we've made you proud and that the magic this show has brought in to your lives never dies." O'Donoghue also took to Instagram where he reaffirmed that working on the show has been "the most amazing experience". Jennifer Morrison, who played Emma Swan, the protagonist for the first six seasons of OUAT accompanied her Instagram post with "the endless hours of hard work and devotion that every crew member contributed to the show is what made magic possible every week for 7 years".
Happy Ever After
In truth, 'Once Upon a Time' has been showing signs of a decline for quite some time now. In it's first few seasons, the series was such a success Stateside, that it spurred on it's own spin-off 'Once Upon a Time in Wonderland'. However, the constant loss of viewers meant the series' viewership fell from 11.8 million to just 3.8 million in the seventh season. Speaking to EW, Horowitz and Kitsis mentioned that they "did not go into this season assuming there would be a season 8", meaning they've had time to consider how to bring the series to an end. It's not yet known whether any old faces will return to the show for its final episode. So, it looks like the portal to Storybrooke is closing forever, unless you happen to come across a magic bean, that is.
